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UCLA clinches No. 2 seed in Pac-12 Tournament

UCLA hasn’t played yet this week, but games elsewhere in the Pac-12 sealed the Bruins a No. 2 seed in the conference tournament. The team will start its Las Vegas schedule with a 6 p.m. tipoff on Pac-12 Networks next Thursday.

Colorado helped UCLA by beating Stanford, 59-56, Wednesday night and knocking the Cardinal to 9-8 in league play. Arizona State also fell out of the race for second one night prior with a loss to Oregon.

The Buffaloes and Sun Devils are sitting at 10-7, leaving them 1.5 games behind the Bruins. Even if UCLA loses to both Washington and Washington State to end the season, it would head head-to-head tiebreakers against both in the event of a three-way tie.

Barring a bad loss between now and Selection Sunday, AZ has all but sewn up a #1 west seed even if they have a close loss to a quality team in the Pac 12 semis or finals.

Bruins are all but in the tourney but need to beat the WA schools and have a solid Pac 12 tourney showing to avoid the dreaded 7/8/9/10 seeding with subsequent likely matchup against a #1 or #2 seed in the Round of 32. Getting slotted out in the West region and/or in San Diego for the rounds of 64 and 32 would be huge for obvious reasons.

The real battle will be for the remaining NCAA tourney spots among several Pac 12 schools including Oregon, Cal, ASU, Colorado, and Stanford who are holding down 8,9, 10 seeds and a “first four out” position according to a few popular “bracketologies” out there. My guess is 3-4 of those get in but will be largely predicated on how they close out the season and how they do in the Pac 12 tourney. Thus, UCLA should be prepared for a war right from the get-go in the quarterfinals as a #2 seed.

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